1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to information retrieval systems and, more particularly, to systems and methods for providing searchable prior history.
2. Description of Related Art
Networks, such as the Internet, have become great sources of information and services. Users view many different Internet documents, but no mechanism exists for easily finding this content again. Current search engines do not tailor results to the individual user. Some search engines have tried, but they rely on storing client information on the server and tailoring the results from there. This creates privacy concerns because the user's actions are stored remotely and sent over the Internet. It also adds latency to the search process.
Users may also create bookmarks to flag previously-viewed documents. Creating a bookmark, however, requires that the user perform some action at the time when the document is viewed. As a result, the bookmarks are useless when a user desires content that the user did not previously bookmark.
Current web browsers, such as Microsoft's Internet Explorer, record some search history of the user. The web browser may even permit the user to search for terms in pages previously viewed by the user. The web browser does not, however, provide the search results in any meaningful way to the user. For example, the web browser typically returns the search results in an alphabetic order.
Therefore, there exists a need for a passive mechanism to monitor a user's activity and search a history of the activity in a meaningful way.